scholarly journals The Scale of Online Course Anxiety: Assessing College Students’ Anxiety in Online Courses

2021 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Xinyang Li ◽  
William Lan ◽  
Amanda Williams

The purpose of this study was to develop an instrument to measure student online course anxiety, a factor that detrimentally affects student learning in the online environment. Based on Keegan’s theoretical framework that identified fundamental differences between online education and traditional education, the instrument of Scale of Online Course Anxiety (SOCA) was developed and tested with a sample of 170 students from a 4-year higher educational institution. The total score and the four subscale scores show high reliability. Confirmatory Factor Analysis exhibited solid goodness of fit between SOCA items and the factor structure hypothesized in previous literature. Evidence of divergent validity shows SOCA differentiates the state anxiety and trait anxiety as expected. Limitations and possible topics for future research are also discussed. 

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Darin R Oviatt ◽  
Charles R. Graham ◽  
Jered Borup ◽  
Randall S Davies

Research has suggested that independent study students may benefit from engaging with a proximate community of engagement (PCE) while completing an online course and that they perceive that such engagement will help them succeed. Independent Study students were surveyed at the completion of their course to assess the level at which they actually interacted with a PCE. Survey findings were confirmed with follow-up interviews with students and their parents to triangulate survey data. Findings revealed that students in the study interacted with a PCE when completing the course. The percentage of students actually engaging with a PCE was lower than the percentages of students from a previous study who perceived that such engagement would be helpful. The research suggests that students made aware of the benefits of a PCE at the beginning of the course, and who receive coaching to curate that community as an assignment in the course, will be more likely to receive the learning benefits of community engagement. Future research to confirm the value of engaging with a proximate community, identifying most helpful and effective interactions, and helping students curate such a community were proposed. Keywords: Independent study, adolescent, online courses, online community, adolescent community of engagement, proximate community of engagement


Author(s):  
Whitney Kilgore ◽  
Patrick R. Lowenthal

The Human Element Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on the Canvas open network was designed to be a connectivist experience exploring methods for the humanization of online education. This MOOC introduced and discussed methods that faculty could adopt in order to potentially increase instructor presence, social presence, and cognitive presence within their own online courses. The design of the MOOC and the learners' perceptions of social presence after taking part in this MOOC are discussed in this chapter.


2016 ◽  
pp. 1736-1755
Author(s):  
Whitney Kilgore ◽  
Patrick R. Lowenthal

The Human Element Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on the Canvas open network was designed to be a connectivist experience exploring methods for the humanization of online education. This MOOC introduced and discussed methods that faculty could adopt in order to potentially increase instructor presence, social presence, and cognitive presence within their own online courses. The design of the MOOC and the learners' perceptions of social presence after taking part in this MOOC are discussed in this chapter.


Author(s):  
Marc R. Robinson

Student perceptions of online courses are likely influenced by two overarching aspects of quality: instructor quality and course design quality (Ortiz-Rodriguez, Telg, Irani, Roberts & Rhoades, 2005). Both of these forces in online education may be analyzed using a well-known model of instructional design - Gagnés instructional design and cognition theory, the centerpiece of which are the nine events of instruction (Gagné, Wager, Golas, & Keller, 2004). Multiple studies positively correlate learner attitudes and perceptions of the online course to instructor quality. Early studies evaluating instructor quality attempted to correlate instructor quality with the attitude and perception of the learner, but not directly to learner success or course design quality. Researchers of online courses, such as Palloff & Pratt (2003), discussed the role of the instructor in depth while neglecting the roles of the learner, the institution, and course design. The main focus remained instructor-centered, and highlighted key instructor tasks such as understanding the virtual learner in terms of roles the learner plays, fostering team roles for the learner, designing an effective course orientation, and identifying potential legal issues the instructor might face (Palloff & Pratt, 2002, p. 16). A distant secondary focus was on effective course design. This highlighted instructor tasks in building an effective online learning community without highlighting the roles effective communication tools would play.


Author(s):  
Susan C. Aldridge ◽  
Mark L. Parker

A key component of quality assurance in online higher education is the periodic evaluation of fully online courses, by both internal and external reviewers, against standards developed by the offering institution. These standards can address a variety of quality areas including but not limited to: the organization and structure of the online course; the extent to which technology is used to foster learning and student engagement; and the use of available communication features to stimulate student discussion and interaction. In this paper the online evaluation processes and criteria of the two largest U.S. state universities involved in online education – University of Maryland University College and Troy University – are compared. It will be shown that the two institutions arrived independently at very similar quality standards for online courses, and that these standards are congruent with those developed and promulgated by nationwide higher education accreditation agencies in the U.S.


10.28945/4684 ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 16 ◽  
pp. 123-142
Author(s):  
U. Yeliz Eseryel

Aim/Purpose: This paper investigates the factors contributing to student IT self-leadership in online education using an exploratory study. Specifically, our goal was to understand whether the instructors’ transformational IT leadership and the students’ personal innovativeness with IT contributed to student IT self-leadership. Background: The study was conducted in an online course. While today’s students are expected to be IT natives, they still lack the skills to find and learn technologies on their own. This is problematic for both online education and students’ future careers. Directed-teaching methods are not appropriate to solve this kind of problem, a more constructivist teaching method is appropriate. We recommend that instructors adopt transformational IT leadership to set norms around technology use, to be role models in using online course technologies with utmost knowledge, and to encourage and support the students in their use of IT. Methodology: An exploratory research is conducted with 46 students in an online management information systems course at a public university. The data were analyzed using PLS structural equation modeling technique. Contribution: This paper introduces the unique concepts of student IT self-leadership and instructors’ transformational IT leadership by adapting concepts from the self-leadership and transformational leadership theories. IT self-leadership refers to the ability to intentionally influence one’s own thinking, feeling, and actions toward the use of IT to reach one’s work and life goals. To increase IT self-leadership, students should try new technologies as much as possible. Instructors should set up norms about trying new technologies, troubleshooting one’s own issues, and play a supportive and encouraging role, rather than employing directed-teaching methods. Findings: IT self-leadership skills are the ability to intentionally influence one’s own thinking, feeling and actions towards the use of IT to reach one’s work and life goals. The findings show that instructors’ transformational IT leadership as well as students’ innovativeness with IT contributes to students’ IT self-leadership. Recommendations for Practitioners: Practitioners may consider exhibiting transformational IT leadership skills including (1) giving encouragement about IT use, (2) fostering trust, (3) encouraging thinking about IT problems in new ways, (4) being clear about their values about IT by practicing what they preach in their IT use, and (5) inspiring students by being highly competent in IT. Potential ways that the instructors can exhibit these skills are discussed in the paper. Recommendation for Researchers: Researchers are recommended to include IT-self leadership of both students and instructors in their investigations on learning success. Furthermore, the inclusion of transformational IT leadership in new studies of teaching and learning success is recommended. Impact on Society: This paper includes students as part of the solution to challenges students face in online courses rather than treating them like passive recipients of educational changes. Thereby, it helps teachers and students to work together for a better solution to educational disruptions. Future Research: Studies should be conducted to determine other antecedents and outcomes of IT self-leadership. Research is needed on specific ways practitioners can increase their IT transformational leadership. While this paper introduced how the instructor of the exploratory study provided transformational IT leadership, more than one way of reaching each goal was practiced. Future research should test the connection between each transformational IT leadership behavior presented here and its outcome.


Author(s):  
Mohammed A. Gharawi ◽  
Azman Bidin ◽  
Koo Ah Choo

Massive open online courses’ technology is becoming the most recent innovations in online education and academia. Recently, it has been widely adopted in educational sectors and gained popularity among both students and instructors. Massive open online courses have rapidly become a trend in the field of higher education and received much recognition from scholars and non-profit educational organizations. Therefore, there has been a growing interest in investigating its limitations, challenges, and impact on education. Some issues and problems have been reported in the research and practice, such as problems related to massive open online course learners’ motivation and engagement during the courses, and course contents’ presentations have a significant impact on learner’s motivation. However, there have been few contributions to the literature in discerning the varying motivational drivers for choosing to consume the different presentation styles of massive open online courses. Therefore, the main goal of this work is to propose an innovative framework for adaptive massive open online course based on learners’ preferences. As such, the courses’ presentations are adapted to the preferred learning style of each learner. In this regard, this paper was conducted based on quantitative research methods.


2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisitsyna Liubov

Churn prediction is a common task for machine learning applications in business. In this paper, this task is adapted for solving problem of low efficiency of massive open online courses (only about 5% of all the students finish their course). The approach is presented on course "Methods and algorithms of the graph theory" held on national platform of online education in Russia. This paper includes all the main steps to build an intelligent system to predict students who are active during the course, but not likely to finish it. The first part consists of constructing the right sample for prediction, EDA and choosing the most appropriate week of the course to make the predictions on. The second part is about choosing the right metric and building models. Also, an approach with using ensembles as stacking to increase the accuracy of predictions is proposed. As a result, a general approach to build a churn prediction model for online course is reviewed and discussed. This approach can be used for making online education more adaptive and intelligent for a separate student.


Author(s):  
Dale Patterson

The modern student exists in a highly technical and digitally driven educational world. Online delivery of courses and interactions, with the primary purpose of enhancing learning, and access to learning opportunities is becoming almost mainstream. Yet, despite the broad availability of online education courses and systems, the completion rates and levels of student satisfaction with online courses remains comparatively low. Studies have indicated that online students are seeking personal engagement to drive their learning. This project looked at the importance of having a human face at the heart of the online course materials to help develop a more personal level of engagement. The project, carried out between 2016 and 2018, involved a randomized control trial of 84 students, and compared two sets of course materials, for a common course topic, one with human face-based resources, and one without. The results clearly showed a significant increase in student engagement with the human face-based resources, but the learning outcomes, for those who completed, were not significantly different between the two groups.


2021 ◽  
Vol 28 (03) ◽  
pp. 387-391
Author(s):  
Hina Khan ◽  
Bushra Zulfiqar ◽  
Asif Mashood Qazi ◽  
Saleem Raza Khuhawar ◽  
Khalique-ur- Rehman ◽  
...  

Objective: To evaluate the pros and cons of an online course from medical students' standpoint. Study Design: Cross Sectional study. Setting: At Al-Tibri Medical College and Hospital. Period: January 2020 to May 2020. Material & Methods: After taking ethical approval, 200 students were equally divided into basic medical sciences and clinical sciences based on convenient sampling. The participants, after taken verbal consent, filled a self-designed questionnaire. The data were analyzed through SPSS version 21.0 and presented in the form of frequency and percentage. The Chi-square test was applied, and the level of significance was taken P=<0.05. Results: Both medical and clinical medical science students were well-motivated in learning online through online courses. However, the lack of internet facility, poor IT skills, and improper facilitation by the faculty hindered their progress towards achieving good online education. Conclusion: Improvement in the way online courses are delivered and taught by the faculty is crucial in increasing student motivation towards online learning, but issues such as poor IT skills and lack of internet facility must be addressed to provide an equal form of e-learning for students.


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